


Descent into the Dark

by tuesday



Category: Rubyquest
Genre: 5+1 Things, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Character Death, Gen, Horror, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 11:13:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16952937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuesday/pseuds/tuesday
Summary: Five staff members who never left the Glen and one patient who got away.





	Descent into the Dark

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Wasuremono](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wasuremono/gifts).



> Wasuremono, in your letter, you said, "Really, this is a pretty straightforward "I like this cool thing, so give me more of it" sort of request. I don't want to explicitly request non-nominated characters, of course, and if you want to focus strictly on Ruby and/or Red, that's fine -- but boy, there are a lot of background characters with implied stories ripe for the telling, and so many evocative details about the Metal Glen that remain unexplained." So I thought I'd give you a smattering of characters, a possible explanation for that foot in a drawer, and potential reasoning for Jay ending up in the water tank, among other things.
> 
> I hope you enjoy, and thank you for the opportunity and excuse to play in this sandbox!

1.

They were trapped down here, all of them, but not Red, never Red. Red was exactly where he wanted—where he _needed—_ to be. He hadn’t been able to kill himself and he was unable to kill his patients, not while the beast below breathed its energy up into them to push their bodies into a mockery of life once more, but that didn't mean he'd given up. Ace had been a person once, but now he was little more than a puppet, another face that thing wore. He was the monster, and the monster was in him.  Ace was the key to this unlife, to this hellish purgatory they were all trapped in.

Even if Red were to leave, he knew his soul would be left behind, and whatever shambling mess that left the Glen would bring all the worst that the Glen had to offer with it. Red was no puppet. Red was a scientist and a doctor, a researcher of the highest caliber. Red hunted down solutions to interesting problems the way his ancestors had hunted down prey to fill their bellies with blood, meat, and bone. This situation was a problem he’d unleashed, and he had in his sights the means to rectify it.

Ace was the key, and Red intended to snap it off in the lock.

2.

It had been a good job offer. The hours were long, and Bella's duties were a hodgepodge of what was actually listed (secretarial) and what gaps the rest of the staff didn't or couldn't fill (security, technology, project management), but it paid well, and she wasn't the only one overworked. Ace had confided it was much the same for him. He was an orderly, and sometimes that meant acting the janitor (cleaning bedpans and other patient messes) and sometimes something like security (helping their more confused patients back to their rooms and out of restricted areas when they went wandering), not to mention all the times he had to administer treatment. It was a small staff, but they'd been told that was subject to change if they made any progress and the project really took off.

Things changed, but the staff didn't expand, only Bella's duties. Where before she was expected to welcome visitors, now she was expected to ward them away. Where before she provided the occasional tech support, now she was in charge of the facility's systems entirely. Where before she helped keep the doctors organized and on track, now she was the only one engaging in any documentation of this project's descent into the strange and the terrifying and the absurd.

She wasn't alone in this. Ace's messes to clean were bigger and bloodier than ever. His patients were even more confused and intent on escaping. He was now the only one administering any treatments, and Bella found it difficult to turn her eyes from his methods. She was the only one spared his attention. Whatever drove him these days, whoever's orders he followed, he figured out early on that her life was now inextricably linked to the facility's continued successful operation. He left her alone, and it was the only mercy she knew.

It had been a good job offer. Bella wished she'd kept looking.

3.

Something had gone seriously wrong. His thoughts slid side to side, scrambled, scrambling. He couldn't say with searing certainty where he was, who he had been. Even his name had been stolen from him, slipping softly away every time he tried to reach for it. Everything in him screamed to stay solitary, spoke danger in any figure distantly seen.

There was a sprawling mass of eyes and grasping hands in Lab B, whispering to bring it scissors, bring it tools, bring it something to slice itself free from the walls. There was a silent stalker who gave the impression of something slumbering beneath, something singing, something half-asleep that was nevertheless starting to open its eyes. There was a smiling fox with a sad face who said, "No one can help you now."

Every time he saw someone, he listened to his instincts. He sprinted away. Hallways led to hallways. Doors led to doors. Room after spinning room stretched out before him, and every step was one taken in an endless circle.

Hands grasped his shoulders. A smile, smaller than the fox's, gleamed before him. He could see scalpels reflected back at him in his fellow doctor's eyes.

"Ah, good, I found you. Never to worry, I'm here to help. It didn't work before, but that just means we'll have to try again. As many times as it takes _until_ it takes."

Helpless, he asked, "Do you know my name?"

If the squirrel knew, he never said.

4.

Filbert was the only clean one. The others were wrong, all wrong. Their skin was strange, sported extra, tumorous growths, whatever treatment they'd used gone wild, cancerous—consuming and hungry. Even if they looked all right at first, it was only a matter of time until their true colors showed, all extra eyes and arms and legs, bony protrusions growing from their skulls and fleshy globules bursting forth from their faces.

"I'm a goat. The horns are supposed to be there." Dr. S had said that first time, lying, always lying. "And that’s just a mole. I've had it since I was a kid."

Dr. S was unclean. Filbert's notes said so. Filbert had been feeding the contaminant into the food supply. Only Filbert had known not to eat. Only Filbert had escaped the disease. His early notes said it was a cure-all, said something about finding the source to immortality, but _Filbert had known not to eat_. Filbert was fine. Everything was fine. Even his colleagues and patients would be fine if they just let him cut the bad out.

"It's okay," Filbert reassured Dr. S's corpse, cutting away a foot. "I'll take care of it. I'm the only one thinking clearly right now, but I can fix it. I can fix it."

Filbert could fix it. Filbert was fixing it. He put Dr. S's head in a cabinet to await a time when he had more precise tools. Stitches had already proven they could put anyone back together again, and this wasn't the first time Dr. S had walked off a little light dismemberment. It was fine, everything was perfectly fine, because Filbert was still clean.

5.

This is what Ace knew:

His name was Ace. His face was a bird's, even if he had to make a new one to cover the worms beneath. The facility was on lockdown, and Bella must be allowed to manage it undisturbed. Messes should be cleaned. The patients were not allowed in restricted areas. All test subjects must receive their treatments.

This is what Ace did for his job:

Ace patrolled the rooms and corridors. Sometimes the patients got out of their rooms and into restricted areas. He returned them. Sometimes the patients made this difficult. He subdued them, then returned them. Sometimes the doctors forgot they were patients, too. He administered treatment until they remembered. Sometimes the patients escaped him—for a time. He always caught up. Always.

This is what Ace did for himself:

Sometimes Ace was injured in the course of his duties. One of the patient's had a face like Ace's was supposed to be. Ace made himself a new face. The patient helped him.

This is what the helpful patient did:

The patient modeled the proper face. Sometimes from the outside. Sometimes from within. The patient helped with a lot of things. Water flowed in and around the facility. It carried itself and it carried the treatment. The treatment was in the patient's blood, and the patient was in the water tank, giving of himself and ready to be pulled out when Ace needed to make a proper face again. The patient was a model patient in more ways than one, hanging on his hooks and doing his part. The other patients should strive to follow his example, but they never did. 

This is what the rest of the patients did:

Hurt Ace. Tried to escape. Hurt Ace. Refused treatment. _Hurt Ace._

It was little wonder Ace listened whenever the voice told him he needed to bash their heads in again.

1.

Ruby woke up in a box. It was very dark, hardly anything to be seen. It was time to begin; it was time for it to end.

With a host of clamoring voices and conflicting ideas all crying out for attention in the back of her head, Ruby knew only this: come hell or high water, she was getting out of here.

(And Ruby did.)


End file.
